


Regaining Perspective

by Ray_Writes



Category: Arrow (TV 2012)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Aphrodisiacs, F/M, Love Potion/Spell, Masturbation, Pre-Episode: s03e17 Suicidal Tendencies, Sexual Content, Sexual Fantasy, Smut
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-12
Updated: 2020-03-04
Packaged: 2021-02-28 00:55:20
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 20,643
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22685074
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ray_Writes/pseuds/Ray_Writes
Summary: Cupid's attempt to hit the Arrow with a potent love dart goes awry when the archer's buried feelings for a certain Pretty Bird resurface instead.
Relationships: Laurel Lance/Oliver Queen
Comments: 46
Kudos: 61
Collections: Lauriver Valentines





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Hello all! Just a little bit of a slightly cracky idea in the Valentines' spirit. I have a fluffier, straightforward oneshot planned for the official Day as well, but the Lauriver discord persuaded me to release this one early. Many thanks to them, and especially to Okoriwadsworth for beta-reading. Also, it should be noted that I borrowed the name of the shop owner from a list of Poison Ivy's aliases; up to you whether you want to believe this is Earth-1 Pam or not. At any rate, I hope you enjoy!

It had been sweet of her love to try and find her a new job, but Carrie wasn’t really interested in living on-site, so she’d given ARGUS the slip. It was just too far away from where she needed to be, anyway. With the Arrow.

Of course, the Arrow didn’t seem to think so. That presented a problem. But Carrie wasn’t about to give up, so she researched and dug around until she found herself in the shop of one Lillian Rose, specialist in botany, homeopathic treatments, remedies and more if a person knew just what they were after.

“The key is to be the first person he sees. If he associates the feelings and pheromones with someone else, he won’t imprint on you.”

“Of course not.”

“This isn’t foolproof. If he encounters someone for whom he does harbor intense feelings, the imprint will fail and the heightened moods, sensations and everything that goes with it will redirect whether he saw you first or not.”

“That won’t be a problem,” Carrie told her with a smile. “My lover doesn’t love anyone but me. This is just to remind him of that.”

Lilian Rose just raised both eyebrows. “Well, you better be ready for some love, because I’ve been informed by previous clients the mixture can produce a very strong aphrodisiac effect.”

Carrie giggled with excitement and anticipation. Oh, she could not wait!

She took the vial and its corresponding antidote back to her current hidey-hole. Carrie set to work making it the perfect little love nest for two. Once that was done, all it came down to was finding her love and pricking him with her newly equipped dart — a true Cupid’s arrow, if she did say so herself.

It took longer than she’d wanted — they’d missed Valentine’s Day. But it couldn’t be helped when the Arrow seemed to be MIA more often than not of late.

She found him one night with some of his little groupies, the one in red and a new one in black and blonde, fighting a few armed men. It was nothing special. But she did so love watching him.

It also gave her the perfect opportunity to position herself on a roof, take aim, and fire the dart she would have never had in a direct confrontation with him. As it was, it sailed true just under his chin to stick in his neck — one of the few vulnerable spots on him.

Unnoticed by his allies, the Arrow faltered and reached for his neck, staring dumbly at the dart. Now for her grand entrance.

Carrie stepped up onto the roof’s ledge. “Yoo-hoo!” She called softly.

She watched with glee as he looked up, eyes widening at the sight of her. His whole body went sort of slack, and she thought she saw the glint of his teeth in a smile.

But one of the men he’d been fighting seemed to notice his inattention and advanced towards him, gun drawn. Carrie gasped and drew her bow once more, but she was too slow for what happened next.

“Arrow!” The woman in the group threw her nightstick at the armed man bearing down on Carrie’s lover, knocking his shot off course. The Arrow had turned in the direction of the shout and—

“No!” Carrie whispered to herself, watching his posture tense and then relax once again.

It couldn’t be an imprint. It couldn’t be! He must not have really seen her on the roof, and he was falsely imprinting on this new woman parading herself around in that leather.

Before Carrie could try to draw his attention again, he suddenly leapt into action, striking down the various assailants this other woman was supposed to be dealing with. He left them all on the ground, groaning and bleeding, then strode up to that other woman. Carrie’s heart jumped into her throat—

But he stopped there. They were talking. Just talking. Nothing had happened. He hadn’t imprinted on his little lady friend, of course not.

The group of three quickly left the scene, and Carrie resolved to let things simmer another day. Once he saw her again, he’d be all hers.

Or else.

\---

Oliver wasn’t sure what had just come over him. He’d felt a sharp sting in his neck, struggled to remove some kind of projectile and thought he saw Cupid of all people, even though Cutter was meant to be in ARGUS custody. But for some reason, it hadn’t bothered him. He’d almost been happy about it, until Laurel had called him back to the reality around them.

And called him to _her,_ to just _seeing_ her in that moment. Her wig whirling about her face with each movement as she had traded blows with a man a good head taller than her, sending him to the ground with a powerful uppercut before hurling her nightstick towards a second attacker Oliver hadn’t even noticed had had him in his sights.

She’d lost her weapon in order to protect him in his moment of distraction. Oliver had felt both a great swell of gratitude and a rush of fear for her, diving in to take care of the remaining gang members that might have tried to hurt her. He was supposed to be protecting her out here, not the other way around.

With those men taken care of and Roy subduing the last of his own, their work had been finished. Oliver had picked up Laurel’s nightstick and presented it to her.

“Thanks,” she’d told him.

“Thank you,” he’d replied earnestly. Up close, her beauty had been even more striking. Her eyes, pretty and green and framed by the mask, her lips accentuated by the dark color she’d painted over them with. It had practically drawn him in.

“Back to the base?” Roy had asked as he walked up to them, and Oliver had needed to blink a couple times to really process the question.

“Yeah.”

The other two had turned and started walking to where their bikes had been parked before the fight had broken out. Oliver had followed at a slightly more sedate pace, content to admire the view of Laurel from behind. They weren’t fishnets, but he’d have to be a blind man not to notice her legs and ass in that leather.

It was that thought which caused Oliver a moment’s pause. He wasn’t _meant_ to be noticing Laurel’s physical attributes, plenty though they were, was he? He’d trained himself out of the habit over the course of the previous year, because she wasn’t his anymore to look at or imagine all the things he wanted to do to her in that leather right now. It was making his own pants feel tighter than usual.

She’d said they were done and he was meant to be respecting those wishes. He was meant to be moving on with, with somebody. Felicity or someone who was available and might be willing to like him. Right?

Oliver realized he was now officially falling behind, so he picked up the pace to catch up with the other two. Roy was getting on his bike and Laurel stood waiting to get on behind him. She was going to ride with Roy? This realization bothered him immensely.

“Canary,” he called out before he could stop himself. She looked over. “A minute?”

Laurel and Roy exchanged a look before she crossed closer to Oliver’s bike. Oliver sent Roy on with a wave of his hand. If his student wasn’t waiting for them, that decided who Laurel would be riding with. He felt quite pleased, until he realized he needed to come up with something to say.

“Thanks, uh, again.”

“Oh.” Laurel’s eyebrows rose. “I thought this was going to be the lecture about my leaving myself open to attack by giving up a weapon.”

“No, it was — you have good instincts. You just need to refine your skills and learn to think a couple steps ahead in the fight.” 

He could tell she doubted his sincerity. Why had he been so cruel to her about this before? Just to keep her off the field? It clearly hadn’t worked.

If she was to be here, he wanted her to be safe above all else. So he said, “We could go over that.”

She eyed him doubtfully. “You want to train me.”

“Yeah.”

“Why?”

“Because you’re important to me,” he told her, hoping this admittance at least was allowed. Whether Laurel could even remember loving him all those years ago or not, Oliver wasn’t sure he could ever forget. Each time he tried, the feelings just came back even stronger, like now.

And something softened in her gaze at his words. Something like the old days. “I’ll have to schedule you around my other trainer.”

“Other trainer?” Oliver frowned. As far as he knew, Grant was still recovering from injuries sustained from fighting Danny Brickwell. Laurel had found someone else?

“Yes, she’s very strict about punctuality. And she has first dibs on times.”

He felt himself relax immediately. So far as he knew, Laurel was not pursuing relationships with other women. She supposedly wasn’t pursuing relationships with anyone. She was available and liked him enough to tolerate being around him even at his worst.

 _And now you’ll be spending more time with her,_ a voice in his head whispered. _On the mats. Sparring. Grappling._

He licked his lips. “We can work out a schedule. Come on.”

Oliver got on the bike and felt Laurel swing a leg around and settle behind him, her chest to his back. Laurel’s arms circled around his middle, feeling like a hot brand. He sucked in a breath he wasn’t sure if she noticed or not, then started the bike.

Sharing a ride across the city together felt so right, he wondered why he hadn’t offered before. Yes, he tried to keep his distance so as not to impose on her, but this was strictly a practicality. She had to get from one place to another. She didn’t have to know he felt a warmth in his heart at feeling her rest her cheek against his shoulder or shift her arms to hold on a little more securely.

He could risk being a little warmer with Laurel, a little more open. He missed that about them. He missed them, period, but if he couldn’t have Laurel’s love then he wanted her friendship.

They arrived back at the base to get changed and check in with their teammates who had remained behind.

“I thought I heard something on the comms earlier. An unaccounted voice,” Felicity said.

They all looked around and shrugged at each other. “Interference?” Roy guessed.

“More like a person.” She frowned. “Whatever it was is probably long gone now, so I guess that’s a night. I’m heading to Ray’s, so I can’t really stick around — um, we’re just having dinner,” she lied unconvincingly as she stood and grabbed her purse.

“Mm-hm,” Digg said, looking at Oliver for some reason. Oliver shrugged back. So what if Felicity was sleeping with her boyfriend? It wasn’t any of his business.

If anything, he felt relief. Felicity had found a happiness that wasn’t dependent on him, and with a person far better suited to her. He was free to let her and that what if drift away, especially knowing as he truly did that his thoughts would always have some level of preoccupation with someone else.

As if summoned, Laurel emerged from the changing area and walked up to his side, frowning and squinting at the side of his neck. “Did you get hurt?”

“What?” Oliver thought back. There had been a moment of sharp pain, and he’d pulled…

But Laurel touched the spot, and whatever he’d been thinking about left his head. “Looks like it clotted up on its own.” Her thumb came back with some dried blood on it.

“I’m fine,” he assured her, torn as he was between not wanting her to worry and enjoying her attention. He almost wanted to find some excuse for her to place her hand back there again.

But Laurel nodded and turned away.

“Any plans tonight?”

She sent a quizzical look over her shoulder. “Sleep?”

Oliver looked down, his eyes squeezing shut for a minute. “Right.” What was it, two-thirty? “Right… Goodnight.”

“Goodnight.” Laurel’s footsteps retreated away from him, and he looked up to see John was now watching him with a troubled looking expression. Oliver frowned and turned away. Digg had always disapproved of him and Laurel, of him even liking Laurel it felt like sometimes, ever since he’d missed the setup to catch Deadshot in favor of remaining at Queen Manor when she and the others had taken refuge there.

Well, he’d make the same choice a thousand times over! Brother or no, John’s revenge hadn’t been worth Laurel’s life, or Tommy’s or the little boy they’d been protecting. If his friend couldn’t get over that, Oliver didn’t have to acknowledge his _advice_ regarding his love life any longer.

He left the base for his and Thea’s loft, finding it empty since she was still at the club. Malcolm was nowhere in sight, seemingly stretching his legs after being stuck on the couch while recovering from his trip to Nanda Parbat. Oliver decided to make use of the shower while it was open, examining the little nick in the side of his neck in the mirror first. 

A bruise was forming there from some kind of impact, and he had the thought he should know what that meant. But he found himself remembering Laurel’s touch instead, feeling like a whisper against his skin. Oliver shrugged off whatever the thought had been and stepped into the shower, turning it on.

He wondered what Laurel was doing in her apartment. In bed already? Distracted by a case file? Showering like he was? He could picture her standing under the shower spray perfectly, as intimately familiar as her body was to him no matter how long it had been since he’d had the privilege of viewing it. With a low groan, his own body started to show its approval of this possible scene.

Normally when his thoughts strayed in that sort of direction — and he was usually very good at ensuring they did not — he immediately twisted the shower knob over to freezing cold and forced himself to think about anything else while he cooled down. But there just seemed to be something about tonight, so he let his imagination run free.

Her hair would be dark with the water that spilled over her head and down her body to pool at her feet. There would be almost an ethereal shine to her skin, water and soap suds mixing together. He pictured himself there with her, or her with him, lathering up his hands to smooth over her back and those hard-to-reach places. In his imagination, Laurel took his hands and brought them around to her front, cupping them over her breasts and squeezing. Her moan was his moan as his fingers clenched and his length twitched. This imaginary Laurel left his one hand to play while dragging the other lower down her body to where they both wanted.

In reality, he made a loose circle with his fist around his cock, flushed red and standing up to near full attention already. Oliver began to lazily thrust into that circle, all the while caught up in the fantasy of Laurel guiding his hand to her entrance, granting him the permission to tease her with light strokes barely slipping in past the first knuckle. She was wet with slick rather than water, and her folds were swollen with want. He could hear the little whines she would always make perfectly, called up from his own memory.

In the manner of a fantasy, they were suddenly front to front, and Oliver had three fingers deep into her sex, crooking them to reach her g-spot and make her wail.

“More, Ollie! More!”

His hips started moving faster of their own accord, fucking into his fist now with grunts and groans of pure need. He needed the friction just as much as he needed it to feel—

Like Laurel’s walls, clenching around him as her heels dug into his lower back to push him in tighter, deeper. They didn’t know anything except each other and this rush of completeness, of him feeling her and filling her. No other woman had felt so right as this.

“I love you, Ollie, I remember!” Laurel cried out, spasming around him in the throes of orgasm and—

He spilled over his own fist with a moan of her name, giving one or two more jerky thrusts before stilling, breathing heavily under the spray as the fantasy fully faded and his come washed down the drain.

It wasn’t possible, perhaps, but what he wouldn’t give for it to be true. For them to kiss softly as he helped her lower her legs back to the ground, for them to dress for bed and curl up under the covers and around each other, for Oliver to be planning idly what he would make them for breakfast the next morning. He’d longed for that kind of life for months now, but adding Laurel to that idyllic picture made it all the more wonderful and yet unbearably out of reach.

He wanted her to smile at him again, the way she had at the announcement that the Arrow was being recognized by her father and the police. He wanted to laugh with her, hold her through the good times and bad, and to be each other’s home. He wanted so much more than sex. He wanted to make love and to be loved in return.

But try as he might, he always failed to make her happy.

Oliver shut off the water that had long turned cold without his notice and stumbled out of the shower, shivering a little as the cool air hit his sensitive flesh. He toweled off and pulled on a pair of sweatpants to sleep in.

When he opened the door, Thea’s voice called out tentatively, “Ollie?”

“Yeah, Speedy.” She must have gotten home just recently after closing up the club for the night. “How was work?”

She came into the hall. “Um, good. How was… stuff?”

He shrugged. “Fine enough.” She kept peeking behind him, so he pointed a thumb at the bathroom. “It’s free.”

“It is? Oh,” she said as if to herself a moment later. “Right, that makes sense.”

“What does?”

“Nothing. I’m gonna call it an early night.” His sister hurried up the steps and to her room. It was clear she was avoiding talking about something, but it didn’t seem to be anything severe. He’d wait for her to talk.

As it was, his mind was still on Laurel. How to finally make things right like he had once promised himself? The first thing was no more pushing her away, whether through putting up a cold facade or lying. These were his two mechanisms for survival at the end of the day, but if he even wanted the _hope_ that Laurel might one day remember him for the things she had fallen in love with so long ago, he had to find those better parts of himself again.

What had he accomplished through being distant with his loved ones other than putting distance between them and garnering a reputation with any new friends that he was not to be approached without extreme caution? He didn’t want to be some kind of pariah. He’d spent so long on an island, and he just wanted to be home.

 _Come home to me,_ Laurel’s voice had begged him once, reaching him in his most desperate hour.

He would re-commit to them, to being a man she might find herself still capable of loving. Everything he had told himself about not being able to be the Arrow and Oliver Queen seemed foolish; why waste whatever time he might have when he could have been making the most of it? And making the most of it with her.

He drifted off to dreams of them, and part of him wished he never had to wake up.

\---

Carrie was about ready to kill someone. _How_ could her plan have gone so awry?

If only he wasn’t surrounding himself with other people these days. Then she could have gotten to him on his own, without the risk of someone else interfering. But as it was, she was finding that impossible.

She tracked him down the next night, only to find him trailing after the woman in black leather as if he were her sweet dog. It made Carrie want to gag, but at the least she hadn’t seen them kiss or make any other sort of advance towards each other. Perhaps this other woman knew not to touch what wasn’t hers. Carrie would make her death quick and painless out of gratitude.

Back in her base, she read over the directions and warnings that had come with her purchase. The maximum recommended period for allowing the intended person to remain under the influence was forty-eight hours, with an observed drop in higher brain functions following that duration. Carrie worried her lip; she hadn’t meant to permanently handicap him!

This was all that other woman’s fault. Black Canary. If she hadn’t gotten in the way, Carrie could have gotten her lover safely home two nights ago and administered the antidote once they’d had some fun.

She could have shot the antidote at him tonight, but then she’d have done all of this for nothing. It wasn’t fair! She was supposed to be enjoying his undivided attention right now, not some woman who had gotten lucky. Carrie was _so sure_ he had seen her and that the imprint would take effect, but he must not have fully realized who she was before turning to his lady friend and locking onto her instead.

Carrie held the antidote in her hands. Should she just do it? She didn’t want her lover to suffer.

But by the time she went out to scour the streets once again, the Arrow and his lackeys had disappeared for the night. She would just have to find him the next one, before he became little more than Black Canary’s sex doll.

He was supposed to be _hers,_ damnit!

\---

Laurel wasn’t sure what had come over Oliver in the last day or so, and she didn’t know how to feel about it. On the one hand, he was finally training her instead of just maintaining that she didn’t have the training. On the other hand, there was all the rest of it.

He was going out of his way to be nice, asking for her input in the field and complimenting her when normally he might just give an approving nod and leave it at that. And she’d lost track of the times he’d touched her arm, her shoulder or found some reason to brush by her in the base. He was also making increasingly transparent excuses for her to hitch a ride on his bike whenever they went out. She and Roy had exchanged more than one confused glance behind his back at this sudden development.

Laurel wished she knew what was causing this latest turn in his mood. She doubted it would last, of course, which was why she was refusing to get her hopes up — no matter how badly her heart fluttered with each compliment he paid her or each little touch. No matter how much she had missed this calmer, kinder side to him that made him seem far less weighed down by all the multitude of stressors in their lives.

Maybe it was their last argument about his withholding the identity of Sara’s killer. Maybe she had been too harsh with some of her words. Of course she remembered loving him. No matter what she did, she couldn’t seem to forget that.

But why should he care? That was the frustrating thing. The little bits of gossip she had picked up around the base seemed to indicate Oliver had nearly had a relationship with Felicity before she started dating Ray Palmer. So what was Laurel? The woman he kept in the wings to fall back on because she was that much of an idiot? Yet the hurt on his face when she’d said those angry words to him had looked real, as much as Laurel hadn’t wanted to see it at the time.

So now, maybe he was overcompensating to try and make her feel better, to smooth things over. That’s what they always did, wasn’t it? It didn’t mean he was suddenly interested again in any kind of _them_ outside friendship and perhaps a working partnership.

Whatever his reasoning, she wasn’t going to pass up training with him when she’d been holding out for just that for several months now. So late that afternoon, she left work with her gym clothes to meet him for a second session.

Oliver was already waiting in his sweats when she arrived. “It’s just us. Diggle is with baby Sara until Lyla gets home, and Felicity and Roy are both at work still.”

“Okay.” Laurel quickly went into the back to change and came out to find him finishing up a round on the salmon ladder, which she supposed counted as a warmup for him. She ducked her head to avoid staring at his exposed chest for too long — the new scars he hadn’t had the last time, the ones she wished she’d been stronger and better to prevent — and went over to the mats to start on her own warmups.

They’d tried her on the salmon ladder yesterday. Laurel had been able to go up two rungs before she’d missed the third rung with the bar on her left-hand side. Oliver had said she just needed to work on keeping both arms even. Laurel had thought she’d be better able to focus on keeping her arms even when he wasn’t watching her, lips slightly parted and fingers twitching at his sides. Had he even realized he’d been doing that? Or how _distracting_ it was?

In the present, he dropped down and grabbed a bottle of water to take a long swig. Then he walked over to her on the mats without grabbing his shirt. Perfect.

“Okay, we did strength training yesterday,” he summarized. “Do you know why?”

She shrugged. Truthfully, she’d been a little annoyed since she could have lifted weights on her own.

“Well, first I needed to see where you are. And you’re in a good place. Room for growth, but that’s a good thing, too. The other reason was to show you where I’m at.”

“I know you’re strong, Oliver,” she remarked, doing her best not to let her eyes dip down to his muscles in demonstration.

He grinned for just a brief moment before schooling his features. “I am, and that’s part of the training I’ve done, but it’s also the advantage I have because of my body type. A lot of guys naturally get that advantage, and most women tend not to.”

“Which is why I should stay home?” She guessed, her arms crossed.

“No,” he replied, which was shocking coming from his lips. “But it determines some of the strategy you’ll want to use in the field. You can’t afford to get into a punch-out with a bigger opponent, because then it becomes about brute strength. Your goal is to end a fight as quickly and efficiently as you can, so you can reserve your strength for longer. Until we can find you a ranged weapon that you’re comfortable with using, that’s going to be our focus.”

He was actually thinking this out thoroughly, she realized. Helping her, thinking about her. It left her feeling sort of warm all over.

“So let’s try and test out that strategy.” He backed up a couple paces and got into a stance. Laurel mirrored him. “I want you to try and take me down in as few moves as possible.”

Fighting a half-naked Oliver. This wasn’t just some weird daydream she’d dropped off to back in her office, was it? Then again, maybe he was doing this on purpose; she had to know how to fight under any kind of circumstances, right?

Determined not to show he had any sort of effect on her, Laurel charged him head on — a mistake, she realized when he knocked her down in a couple moves with a hand on her back to keep her from rising right away.

“Remember, strategy,” he said as he leaned over to speak in her ear. “Rushing an opponent works well when they’re not expecting it, but here I very much am.”

Laurel grumbled under her breath until he finally helped her up with a hand. She shouldn’t be complaining, she knew on one level; Roy had made Oliver’s training sound like torture. Was he holding back with her or something? He was smiling an awful lot, or at the least there was a smile in his voice.

But as Laurel observed him, she couldn’t help noticing it wasn’t a teasing smile. He just seemed… happy. Like he was genuinely enjoying this time together. Her skin seemed to tingle with the realization he was smiling at _her_ most of all. Was she making a bigger deal of this than she should?

She shook her head and charged again, this time feinting at the last second. Oliver blocked her swing from the other side, then Laurel was forced to jump back to avoid his arm. He had a longer reach thanks to his build, too, she grudgingly acknowledged.

But it left under his arm exposed. Laurel jabbed with her elbow, gratified to hear at least a grunt from him. She tried to dance out of his reach a second time, but wasn’t as lucky.

Oliver pulled her back against his bared chest by one shoulder, locking his arms around her middle. She squirmed and kicked out, missing his shin as he started to lift her from the ground.

He had her in a hold, and it was one she recognized, though not from her lessons with Ted or Nyssa. It had been covered in her self-defense classes.

With practiced ease, Laurel went limp to make herself deadweight, then pulled his wrist back to break the hold, spinning around to ram him with her shoulder.

To her great surprise, he actually went down to the mat. Nyssa’s warnings about hesitating in a fight came to mind, and Laurel realized this was probably a test, so she acted accordingly to keep him down. Namely by sitting astride his hips and pinning his arms. It left her leaning over him rather close and panting for breath.

“How was that?”

“Not bad. You’re good at utilizing your various training,” he remarked. “We should find you a couple more forms to round out your skill set, though. You’ve focused a lot on forms involving your upper body, and you could be making better use of your legs.”

Laurel nodded, accepting the critique far better since it wasn’t phrased as a condemnation.

Oliver’s eyes flicked down for a second. “You planning to subdue all your opponents this way?”

“I just wanted to make sure,” she explained. “Sorry.”

He shook his head, a grin coming back to his lips. “No complaints. I’ve been wondering what this felt like.”

Laurel flushed, forgetting her intention to get up. There was really no mistaking that tone, was there? “You did?” She’d noticed him watching her after she’d brought Zytle down, but she hadn’t thought his mind had been going _those_ places. She was astounded to hear it still went those places when it came to her at all.

Oliver nodded, boyish, and it reminded her so strongly of how he could be sometimes, even with all the pain he’d been through in life. Laurel bit her lip and noticed when his eyes dropped to them in response.

“Ollie…?” She had to know and yet couldn’t bring herself to ask the words.

“I- I didn’t want to tell you this right away, because I’d just made up my mind. But I don’t want to lie to you either. I…” he drew in a breath, glancing away for a moment as if searching for the right words.

Laurel leaned back a little, feeling she ought not to be so close during what seemed a serious revelation from him — and that was when she felt a rigid stiffness forming just below where she was currently sat above his pelvis. He was hard.

Laurel jerked back, releasing his arms. “Uh, Oliver—”

“Wait. Laurel, wait.” He grabbed her hands, which made standing up rather impossible. And she couldn’t really slide off him without, well — her face had to be burning with how hot her cheeks felt. How the hell was somebody supposed to address their ex’s very obvious erection for them? Her mouth felt dry and it was difficult to think about anything else except for the fact that this was _happening_ and, from what she’d briefly felt brush her ass, he was just as big as she remembered. Maybe bigger.

Laurel shook her head, trying to clear it. “I don’t know what this is,” she admitted freely. For so long she had assumed that there were no feelings left for her on his part. Maybe he just still found her attractive. Maybe that was all.

“It’s me allowing myself to feel the things for you that I told myself I couldn’t anymore.”

Oliver let her hands go and braced himself on one arm to try and be on a more even level with her. She could leave and let him up now, gather her things and never come back. But she wouldn’t, and she thought somehow they both knew that.

“I know what you’ve said, that we can’t go back and that I’m- I’m not the man you fell for once. I know I can’t expect you to feel the same way, and it’s why for so long I gave up,” he told her, every word sounding like it came from a deep well of earnestly within him. His eyes were staring deeply into hers, the blues of his irises nearly overtaken by the black of his blown pupils. “You deserved better than me. You still do.”

“Wha—” It was all so confusing. He’d given up because he’d thought _she_ didn’t feel anything for _him_?

“But I can’t ignore what my body, my mind and my heart are telling me anymore. I can’t keep burying my feelings because I will reach my breaking point, just like I have now,” he continued. “I love you, Laurel. That’s not gonna change whether you feel the same or not.”

He kept saying things like that, as if she hadn’t lost her heart to him over a decade ago now. Laurel felt totally overwhelmed with this confession, but she had to speak honestly. “It’s never changed. It doesn’t matter how hard I try. But Ollie, this is just so _abrupt._ ”

She wouldn’t be able to handle being jerked around again if his decision changed or he realized what a mistake he was making.

His calloused fingertips brushed her cheek, willing her to look back at him. “I know. I wish I had a better explanation. But whether it was the prospect of losing your faith in me or whether it’s the League and the threat they pose to us, it’s made me realize what a fool I was to keep wasting the time we could have.”

He sat up slowly, causing her to slip a few inches down his lap so that his clothed erection was pressing hot against her core with only a few layers of clothing between them. Laurel’s breath left her in one great _whoosh_ of air, and her heart pounded in her ears. It almost drowned out his next words, low and gravelly as they were.

“As long as I have left, I want to be the man you believed I could be. The man you could love. The man you _need_ as badly as I need you.” He circled his hips as if to demonstrate that need, grinding up into her, and Laurel let out a choked noise.

They couldn’t, not here, not when she was supposed to be preparing for the inevitable clash with the League that she wanted them _both_ to come out of alive. And yet those protests felt weak in her mind when faced with Oliver’s clear want and the desire that began pooling deep within her as well. It had been so long, and could she really refuse him now when it had taken them this long to find each other again? She’d always told herself if she could go back to that night he’d returned from the island a second time… 

He seemed to sense her wavering control, for he leaned in and covered her lips with his own, moving them in perfect rhythm to a dance they both knew so well.

Laurel lost her battle of wills, one hand going to the back of his head and the other roaming up and down his back, giving into her secret wish to touch every bit of exposed skin and relearn it all. He guided her to raise both arms for a moment, pulling her tank top over her head and flinging it to the side before he began running his hands over her abs, back and sides. Laurel moaned around his tongue, shivering more from the goosebumps he was raising along her arms with these touches rather than any genuine cold. But he pressed forward to leverage his body over hers and share their heat.

Her back was still sweaty from working out when he lowered her down onto the mat, and Laurel wondered briefly if she might end up sticking. But all her thoughts left her when he started rubbing against her again, this time with no intention of letting up, not even to take off their clothes. It was so rough and animalistic and like nothing they’d ever done that she found herself speechless. He didn’t have that problem.

“So good… love you, Laurel, always…need you…”

She could feel a damp spot spreading through her underwear and knew that it and her leggings were going to smell like sex by the time this was over. That scent only seemed to spur Ollie on, and Laurel planted her feet on the mat in order to raise her hips to better meet him, along for this frantic ride. 

The new angle had him rubbing right over her clitoris, sending jolts of pure ecstasy through her body. Laurel turned her head, gasping and groaning in turn as he rutted against her like his life depended on it.

She didn’t know if she was that starved for sex or if it was just him, but even this could probably do it for her. He sucked her earlobe into his mouth as his hands slid under her sports bra, and Laurel was forced to admit this was definitely going to do it for her as she keened and arched up against him.

The friction was good, but _God_ , she wanted him in her so badly, or to touch her or do anything he could think of to bring this building pleasure to its peak. But just as she opened her mouth, a different voice spoke.

“Oh! No! That is — I do _not_ need to be seeing this!”

With a gasp, Laurel seemed to come back to herself. They were in the training room that anywhere upwards of ten people had access to. “Felicity?”

Oliver gave no indication he had seen or heard anything and ground against her again. Laurel wriggled out of reach with a not-quite-suppressed whimper at the lost contact, pushing on his shoulders to get his attention.

Felicity stood frozen on the steps, alternately gaping and covering her eyes with a hand. “Is it safe?”

“ _Get out,_ ” Oliver growled.

“Oliver!” Yes, she was embarrassed, but it was honestly their fault and it didn’t give him the right to snap at a friend like that. Laurel tried to push away, but he locked him arms around her waist. “Oliver, let me go.”

“I- Laurel—” he was struggling against something, a wild look in his eyes. It was like he wasn’t in control of himself.

But that was the thing; in mixed company, Oliver was always in control of himself. He would have heard that door opening or at the least Felicity’s first step onto the stairs. He would have found a more secluded, defensible area for their actions in the first place no matter how spontaneously they had occurred.

She’d gone along with it out of a fear that the moment she questioned anything, it would all be ripped away, but she should have been questioning the whole thing from the start.

“There’s something wrong,” she realized.

“Well, I wasn’t going to say it, but I agree there’s something wrong about coming down here and—”

“No, Felicity, I think he’s been drugged or something,” Laurel said. She took Oliver’s face in her hands, studying his pupils still blown wide in desire. Or some kind of high. “Ollie? I’m not mad at you, but we have to figure this out. Okay? Please let me get up.”

With a choked back whimper, he loosened his hold, and Laurel hurriedly leaned to the side to grab her tank top and throw it back on. Once she’d done that, he took her hand. It was like he couldn’t stand not touching her.

Felicity slowly drew closer as they stood. “It could be a metahuman. Maybe he’s been whammied like Barry, except instead of it making him really angry, it, you know—”

“I get the idea.” Even if she wasn’t sure what whammied meant in this context or who Barry was. Barry Allen? That guy at the precinct Oliver had been helping with something? He had to be the Flash, she realized.

“We can try running the test first. Bring him over to the exam table.”

“I can hear you,” Oliver said, sullen and scowling at what he had apparently decided was an unforgivable interruption. He headed over to the table with Laurel, since he still refused to let go of her hand.

Felicity moved past them to some of the supply cabinets, searching for the necessary tools to draw and analyze blood. Laurel squirmed a little while Felicity had her back turned; she could feel the wetness that had leaked between her thighs, and it only served to remind her of her lack of release. Beside her, Oliver’s eyes seemed to zero in on her minute movement, licking his lips and turning towards her.

“No,” Laurel whispered.

“What?” Asked Felicity, turning around and clicking her tongue. “Maybe you two should separate.”

Oliver’s grip on her hand tightened. “No, Felicity. I’m done with you and John persuading me to stay away from Laurel or discrediting her in my eyes.”

Felicity’s mouth fell open. “I— we never said— it’s not like we were running some kind of campaign.”

“But you convinced me she was a distraction. That’s not what she is.” Oliver’s look went soft as he turned to her again. “She’s my home.”

Flattering as it was to hear, Laurel felt herself turning bright red all over again. He was going to be so humiliated whenever they figured out what he was on. “Okay, let’s just let Felicity run the test. It’s for your own good, Ollie, I promise.”

Laurel sat beside him on the exam table when Felicity took the blood and remained there when their friend started running the sample. “I feel like I should apologize,” Laurel said in the uncomfortable silence. “It didn’t really hit me until you walked in what was, um, what we were doing.”

“Well, you couldn’t have known he was on something,” Felicity offered. “And Oliver is… intense at the best of times.”

Yeah, but he had the excuse of being drugged. She probably looked pathetic or like some kind of opportunist just waiting for her chance to get in his pants. Of course he’d have to be high to want her. How could she have been so gullible?

He nuzzled his head onto her shoulder and remained there, sleeping by the time Roy and John came down the steps with bags of food. “Hey, uh… what’s going on?”

“Oliver’s been dosed with something. We’re not sure where or what but it’s, um, affecting his behavior,” Laurel phrased delicately.

“That’s putting it lightly,” Felicity remarked dryly. “I walked in right in the middle of him performing the horizontal tango on Laurel.”

Both of them looked from him to her in shock, and Laurel lowered her gaze. “It was my fault. I should have realized. Should have stopped him.”

“But. He didn’t — you’re okay, right?” Roy asked.

“I’m fine,” Laurel snapped, only to regret it a moment later. She knew Roy was just concerned, but she didn’t care how she was doing at the moment. She’d almost let Oliver make a huge mistake while under the influence of God knew what all because it had made _her_ feel good. She should have known better and been responsible.

The machine Felicity was running the sample on beeped, and Diggle walked over to check it. He had yet to say a word, and Laurel was sure he had to be disgusted. Probably more evidence to put in the campaign.

“There’s definitely something in his system. I think we’re gonna need help analyzing it.”

“I’ll call Barry,” Felicity said immediately.

It only took Barry minutes to show up in their base, confirming her theory about his identity. “Hey guys, you said Oliver’s — oh, he’s asleep. Uh, hi again,” Barry said to her as he stopped in front of the table.

“Hi.”

“So, you’re the Black Canary? That’s cool, I thought maybe you knew about stuff the way you and Oliver were at the precinct.” He turned to Felicity. “So, where’s the sample?”

She passed it to him, and they all watched as his frown grew the longer he studied it.

“This is a really complicated, really potent chemical cocktail. I wouldn’t have advised mixing half of this stuff together, because in combination it could do some really serious damage.”

“What kind of damage?” John was the first to ask.

“Like brain damage,” was the blunt reply. “There’s some really strong aphrodisiac qualities to it, too, so he might just end up—” Barry did a double take in her and Oliver’s direction. “Ah. You already know that part.”

The group nodded.

“Okay, so we know when he was dosed?”

“It had to be somewhere close to two nights ago,” Laurel said. The rest of her team turned surprised and even suspicious gazes on her. “That’s when he started acting… different.”

“You’re right,” said Roy, and she felt grateful to him for backing her up even if she didn’t deserve it. “But something tells me those gang wannabes didn’t do this.”

“That _voice_ I heard,” said Felicity. “I knew there was something! Let me look through the footage.” She hurried over to her computers.

“Would Oliver have seen whoever it was?” Laurel wondered out loud. She remembered now that he’d been distracted by something. It was why she had had to throw her baton to stop one of the men from shooting him. In some ways, that had been a watershed moment, because after that had been when he had proposed the training and everything along with it.

“Why does it only affect him around Laurel?” John asked, breaking her from her thoughts.

“What do you mean?” Asked Barry.

“I mean he hasn’t tried anything with Felicity,” John clarified, his tone sounding almost insulted.

“Uh, well, I couldn’t tell you. Herbalism and homeopathic treatments aren’t my specialty. We should really track down the maker of this stuff so they can tell us more and maybe supply us with the most effective antidote.”

“Cupid!”

They all jumped and looked in Felicity’s direction. Oliver’s head slipped off her shoulder and he fell to rest in her lap.

“Sorry, but — Carrie Cutter was caught by a traffic camera two blocks away from your position about fifteen minutes _after_ the suspected drugging. She could have hit him with some kind of dart without any of us realizing.”

Except Laurel almost had, she realized with another wave of shame. Her fingers traced over the faded bruise on his neck. She shouldn’t have believed it when he said he was fine, she should have done something. They could have prevented this whole thing from happening to him.

“Is this that archer who had a thing for the Arrow?” Barry checked.

“Yeah, and she had it bad. Giving him some kind of roofie would be right up her alley,” John stated.

“Isn’t Cutter in ARGUS custody?” Asked Roy.

“Supposed to be. Lyla can check,” said John. “If a breakout happened while she was on medical leave, they might have given it to a different agent to handle.”

Something else made a noise on Felicity’s screen. “Security’s been tripped. It’s Cutter. She’s sniffing around the club.”

“Last time, she got a friend to narrow down our location by tracking Oliver’s movements,” John said. “She won’t know the way in. We should sit tight.”

“But, John, what if she has the antidote?”

Roy frowned. “Why would she? Doesn’t she want him like this?”

“Not permanently.” Laurel did her best to keep her head up as the others turned to her. “She’d want to believe he doesn’t need it, that he’d still love her if he wasn’t…” She trailed off, realizing she was saying a little more than she truly wanted anyone to know. Laurel slid out from under Oliver’s head and left him lying there on the table as she headed over to the case for her suit. “I’ll get it from her.”

It was the only way she could try to atone for what had nearly happened. If they were able to cure him, Laurel only hoped Oliver would be able to forgive her.

\---

Carrie checked another door, finding it just as securely locked as the last one. She’d been hoping not to have to blow the hinges off, but she was getting desperate. It was approaching the forty-eight hours Lillian Rose’s fine print warned her about, and she hadn’t seen the Arrow out and about in the city anywhere. So she was going to have to come to him.

A shadow moving into the light caught her attention. Black Canary. Well, maybe it wasn’t just who she wanted to see, but it was the next best thing.

“Alright, Cupid. Where’s the antidote?”

“Where’s my lover?”

A snarl turned the other woman’s lips down. “Unavailable, thanks to you. Just hand over the antidote.”

“And trust you to give it to him?” Carrie sneered. “You’ve been enjoying this, haven’t you?”

“This isn’t about me. He needs to be cured.”

“And he will. After I put an arrow in your thieving heart!” Carrie pulled her bow off her back, but was unable to grab for an arrow when Black Canary charged her. Fine, she’d be just as happy to wring the birdie’s neck!

Her bow clashed with the vigilante’s nightstick, a sharp _crack_ ringing through the air. Just as quickly, Canary spun around to the side, leaving Carrie falling forward with the weight of her bow right into the other woman’s fist.

She gasped but hooked her ankle around the Canary’s, sending them both toppling over to the ground. Carrie rolled onto her back, kicking out with both legs and missing. That’s when she realized Black Canary wasn’t behind her anymore, right before the woman’s arm went around her in a chokehold.

“Give up the antidote!”

“Tell me- tell me how you tricked him,” Carrie gasped, nails scratching at the leather jacket. “I know he saw me first!”

“I have no idea what you’re talking about,” the other woman growled. “Now hand it over!”

“I’d rather… _die_ than let you be the- the one to save him!”

She didn’t die, but she did pass out from a lack of oxygen. When Carrie next woke, she was back in her cell with a guard posted outside and medical tape over her neck.

A woman in a black pencil skirt and matching jacket walked up to the bars exuding power and threat without even being armed. “Welcome to Task Force X, Miss Cutter.”

\---

Oliver woke slowly, feeling a sort of heaviness that had nothing to do with physical exhaustion. All at once, it seemed the things that had been pressing on him up until the last two days — the League, Ra’s offer, Thea’s training — reasserted themselves, and he nearly wished he didn’t have to open his eyes.

But he could sense others standing around him and needed to know the situation. So he sat up.

“Easy.” John was there to catch him when he swayed. “You just came down from a pretty serious high.”

“What was in that dart?” The last couple days were coming back to him in sharp relief. The happy high of whatever had been pumped into his system, the resulting change in some of his decisions, his insatiable need for—

Laurel. Where was Laurel?

He looked past Digg, Felicity and Roy to spot her sitting on the steps, her head in her hands. That sight made his heart plummet into his stomach.

He could remember everything as if stuck in some kind of lucid dream, wanting desperately to change the course of events yet unable to look away. He’d grabbed her hands — had she felt forced? Had he hurt her? He needed to know but was terrified to ask.

What had he done to them?

With a rush of wind and a crackle of electricity, Barry suddenly appeared in the base. “Okay, I talked to Cutter’s supplier, Lillian Rose. Sent an anonymous tip to the authorities, too, but I don’t know if they can really get her on anything.” The speedster beamed as he noticed Oliver. “Hey, you’re up! How do you feel?”

“Like myself,” Oliver answered. He held back a wince at how depressed that sounded. “What was it that was…”

“She markets it as a real-life love potion,” Barry explained. “It’s supposed to make the user susceptible to suggestion and lowers their inhibitions and impulse control while increasing their, ah, sex drive.”

“Not that it was really needed in this case,” Felicity muttered.

Oliver grimaced. She’d seen him and Laurel, and what surprised him most was that the regret he might have expected at that pushing her away never came. If anything, he just regretted putting Laurel and himself in that kind of vulnerable position to be discovered.

“It’s triggered by the optic nerve,” Barry was continuing as though he and the others hadn’t heard Felicity’s remark. “Once the drug is in the system, the user sort of ‘imprints’ on the first person they see.”

“So Oliver got hit with the dart, drugs entered his system as he turned and _bam_ — Laurel becomes the target of artificial love,” Felicity summarized. “That makes sense.”

John nodded as well, seeming to take great reassurance in the fact. Oliver looked down. They were doing it again. Distancing her and discrediting any sort of legitimacy to the feelings he had had — the feelings that, sober or no, didn’t seem to have left his system, even if they weren’t nearly so overwhelming.

Why had he let them get into that habit of presuming things about his relationship to Laurel? And not just to her, but to Thea and his mother and even Tommy? He had brought John and Felicity in on his secrets first because of their skill sets, not because he somehow cared for them more than his own family. Even with the ties the three of them had subsequently built, he’d never meant that to come at the expense of his loved ones.

“Well, I dodged that bullet,” Roy remarked, pulling him from those troubling thoughts. “No offense.”

“None taken.” The idea of being forced to want to pursue his own student made him glad there was nothing in his stomach.

“Oh, _that_ would’ve been funny,” Felicity said. “Assuming, you know, everything turned out fine.”

“I don’t think it would have come to that, because Lillian’s information isn’t right,” Oliver said. “I saw Cutter first.”

Without the haze of the drug, he remembered her clearly standing there on the roof, and the bizarre feeling of happiness that had risen in him before his attention had been called away. To Laurel.

“You did?” When he nodded, Barry shifted from foot to foot, seeming to weigh whatever it was in his head, whatever detail he hadn’t shared. Oliver waited, knowing his friend just needed time.

Felicity looked between them, frowning. “How could he see Cupid first but still imprint on Laurel?”

“Lillian said there’s an override.”

“What do you mean?” John was the one to ask. “If a person can override the drug, why not just not let it affect them?”

“That’s the thing, it’s not an override of the drug’s effects, just who triggers the effects in the user.” Barry was only barely glancing at Diggle, and Oliver gradually realized that was because Felicity was standing right beside him, and it was _her_ eyes Barry was trying to avoid. “She said that if the user encountered the person they, um, genuinely held those feelings for, the drug would just amplify them, and they’d forget about the initial imprint.”

It was exactly in line with the way he was feeling now. Forced to admit the truth to himself about his buried feelings while under the drug, he was unable to just reassume the lie. He still loved Laurel. She was his home and his person without a mask — even when wearing one she hid so little of her true self.

That realization was catching up to each of the others. “But there’s not some kind of a second override?” John asked. “Like if he saw someone else—”

“I don’t think so,” Barry told him with a shake of the head. “She just said ‘the person’.”

It was hard to say who was more stunned at this pronouncement, Felicity or John. Roy seemed to be very interested by his shoelaces. But none of their reactions mattered to Oliver in this moment. He looked past them all again—

But the stairs were empty. Laurel had left somewhere in the middle of the conversation. Not that Oliver could exactly blame her, but it meant she didn’t have the whole story. God, what if the last thing she’d heard was Felicity’s remark about artificial love?

“I need to go,” he said, standing up and walking past them.

“Oliver, is that really a good idea?”

“Yes, it is, John,” he ground out. He wasn’t going to stop and have this argument again for the umpteenth time.

Roy called out next. “Oliver.” But when he spun around, his student was holding up a shirt. “Might want one of these.”

With another grimace, he walked back and took it, then grabbed his keys, phone and wallet for good measure. “Barry, thank you for your help,” he paused to say as well, realizing his friend would have had to come out of his way to do so.

But the speedster shrugged. “I just got some information and monitored your condition for a bit. Laurel was the one that fought Cutter to get the antidote from her.”

She’d done that for him? He couldn’t help the bubble of hope that seemed to swell in his chest, the hope that maybe not all was lost. Oliver clapped Barry on the shoulder and left the base, trusting the others to find their ways home for the night. Or perhaps, in Felicity’s case, to their significant other. Oliver was glad for Ray Palmer in that moment; he had helped Felicity to move on before Oliver could hurt her the way he had done to Helena. With irony, he realized he probably should have listened to that particular ex when it came to his true feelings.

Oliver only realized once he was in the elevator up to Laurel’s floor of her apartment building that he had no real plan for explaining himself. Everything he had told her on the mats was the truth, pulled from the deepest parts of his heart. Yet she likely thought them all lies now, or not sincerely meant. 

Did she even want him to have meant them? She’d said her feelings for him had never changed, and she’d responded to his advances quite readily. Enthusiastically, if he really wanted to put a word to it, and he was glad to have full control over his body and its responses to those kinds of mental stimuli once again as he let himself think back to that stolen moment.

But assuming anything felt wrong. He wanted them both to have a clear head for this sort of conversation.

A minute or so after he knocked, Laurel opened the door in her pajamas with towel-dried hair. Guiltily, he recalled his shower fantasy, which stole his breath for a moment.

She hung her head with a sigh. “Oliver, I don’t really want to talk about this.”

“I think we have to,” he said, hoping she would understand he wasn’t doing this to be cruel.

Laurel stepped back to let him through. Once her door was shut, he began, “I don’t know how much you heard, but I have to know first — did I hurt you? When we…”

Laurel shook her head. Oliver let out a breath in relief. He hadn’t crossed that line, and truthfully, he wasn’t sure he could have lived with himself if he had crossed it.

“I can understand if — what happened, the way I… I don’t know how to ask you to forgive me, or if I should even have the right to.”

“Forgive you?” Laurel echoed, and he bowed his head. Only to be stunned by her next words. “Oliver, you were drugged. You weren’t yourself. _I’m_ the one that did something wrong.”

“Laurel, how were you in the wrong?”

“Because I took advantage. Or I let you — I should have known you would never do that on your own.” She turned to the side and leaned against the wall, half-shutting him out.

So Oliver took a step closer. “Not because I didn’t want to.”

He watched her draw in a breath then press her lips together. Not quite ready to talk, but still listening.

“Those things I said to you, they weren’t just something made up by the drug. I don’t deserve you, and I guess instead of trying to be the man you do deserve, I’ve found it easier to be worse.”

Laurel turned her head towards him then. “You’re not worse, you’re just — you’ve moved on Ollie, and that’s okay. You shouldn’t be listening to some drugs to tell you who you’re in love with.”

“I’m not. I’m trying to listen to myself for once, instead of all the excuses for why we shouldn’t be together or the people in my life who demanded that I give up on the one dream I had for myself when I came back from the island.”

Laurel had given up fully on pretending as if she wanted out of this conversation. She was watching him and waiting for him to reach whatever conclusion he was driving at. When it hit him, he nearly wanted to laugh.

“I- I have been struggling this past year to decide if the Arrow and Oliver Queen can coexist, and I realize now that they can’t so long as I keep denying the part of me that _is_ Oliver Queen. The part that spends time with his family instead of just on the mission. I lost that when my mother was killed and Thea left the country, and I am still struggling to get that back,” he admitted. “Or the part that actually spends _time_ out in his city instead of hiding away in a base and only going out to fight. I’ve lost my inspiration for why I do this, and that’s why it feels so much like a chore.”

He stepped forward one more time, so close he could feel a sort of gravity to it pulling them together. “The part that loves you. Cupid’s drug, it let me drown out all the other things, just the _noise_ in my life, and let me focus on what I really want and need.”

And he was speaking of more than the sexual. He hadn’t enjoyed training so much in a long time as the sessions he’d had with Laurel, seeing her progress and thinking of ways they could work to build her up even more. Oliver had thought before that encouraging her desire to be in the field would be irresponsible and dangerous on his part; now he could see that withholding his support had been the real problem.

“But that’s not me,” Laurel insisted. “That’s just companionship. A partner. It could have been anyone standing in my place, and you would have fallen—”

“No, I wouldn’t have.” So she hadn’t heard this part. “I saw Cutter first that night.”

Laurel’s eyes widened. “She said she thought… but then, why not her?”

“According to her supplier, the drug’s imprint effect doesn’t work if the person being drugged comes into contact with the person they already have those feelings for. It just makes them feel those things more strongly for that person.”

Laurel’s mouth dropped open, a silent _Oh_ forming around her lips. Her cheeks turned a faint pink, and her crossed arms slowly fell to her sides.

“So that’s how I feel,” Oliver stated. “Now I want to know how you’re feeling.”

Laurel shook her head. “I don’t know, you keep making it hard to think.” He allowed himself a small smirk at that while Laurel gathered her thoughts.

“I told you I still feel that way. That wasn’t any kind of lie. I just don’t know with everything that’s happening if it made sense for me to tell you that.” She shrugged. “But I guess it’s out there.”

Oliver nodded. “The truth is, everything always seems to be happening. And with the League… I don’t know what will happen next.”

The sensible thing to do would be to mutually agree to leave this subject behind, or table it for some later moment — assuming one even came. The trouble was, this moment in time now seemed to be the final calm before the storm.

Laurel appeared to be reflecting along the same lines. “Every time I think I might have my life in order, that I might be ready, something disrupts it all, and I have to start from scratch.” She squared her shoulders. “I have to stop treating my life as something I have to struggle through just to get to the parts where I’m ‘okay’. I have to find time for myself and what I need.”

Oliver nodded. He could see how, in some ways, he had been living his own life the same way. So much happiness withheld, so many placeholder relationships and encounters because he didn’t think it the right time for what he truly wanted. There was never going to be a right time. There was just time, and possibly very little of it left.

“So,” Laurel continued. “If we both feel this is what we want, and we both agree that we’re okay with however things with the League end…” She trailed off, shrugging a little helplessly and looking to him. “Does it really get to be that simple?”

“I don’t know if simple’s the word I’d use,” he replied. Then he reached out to rest a hand on her shoulder, his thumb rubbing the hem of her shirt collar and just barely brushing her skin. “But I don’t want to reach the end of this without sharing what I can with you.”

Laurel gave the slightest nod, and Oliver knew it was up to him to close the gap between them after he’d done so much to put it there. He leaned in slowly, hand rising to her neck to tilt her chin just so in order to meet her lips with his.

Laurel sighed into his mouth, leaving herself open, but he kept it chaste at first, wanting the illusion of time, that they had all of it they could ever want.

Her teeth catching and pulling on his lower lip told him he’d held back for long enough, so he opened his mouth to her exploration while his hands set about relearning her body. Her softer curves were as he remembered but there was strength and definition to her muscles that were just as pleasing to discover. He wondered if she’d had the same experience getting to know the new him, as it were, after he’d returned from the island.

She pressed herself closer up on her tiptoes, brushing against his front, and a low moan emanated from somewhere in the back of his throat as arousal stirred in the pit of his stomach. It wasn’t all Cupid’s drug that had had his body acing that way, after all.

Laurel swore under her breath and he pulled back.

“Sorry. I—”

“No, it’s not that. It’s kind of flattering, honestly,” she assured him. Then she bit her lip. “But I don’t have condoms.”

Oliver dropped his head to rest on her shoulder. “Right.” Something his drug-addled mind had definitely not considered; he was suddenly grateful he had been too far gone at that point to even think of removing his pants. It didn’t help him in the moment when he very much wanted to, of course.

“We can still work something out,” Laurel said, one of her hands slowly trailing down his chest.

There were merits to that suggestion. But Oliver wasn’t being controlled solely by his physical desires anymore and could notice things like the late hour and the pressed suit hanging from the hook on Laurel’s open bedroom door down the hall.

So he took her hand before it could descend any further. “I’d love to, but it can wait. You have a court case tomorrow, don’t you?”

Laurel’s lips pressed together in a thin line for a moment. “I do.”

He couldn’t quite stop a laugh. “I’ve never seen you less enthusiastic about work.”

“Well, when you get a girl’s hopes up,” she grumbled. Then she started to turn back for the front door. “I should let you go. You probably need to sleep that stuff off some more.”

“Actually,” said Oliver, tugging her to a stop with the hand he was still holding. “I was hoping I could still stay over. Just to be with you, if that’s alright.”

Laurel’s smile seemed to brighten the whole room, and he knew it had been the right request to make. He wanted her to know this was about her and not taking what he wanted before whatever reprisal Ra’s was planning for refusing his offer crashed down on Oliver’s head. “Of course it is.”

He removed his shirt and set his phone, wallet and keys on the bedside table while Laurel grabbed an extra pillow and turned back the bedsheets. On reflection, he decided to send Thea a text to let her know he wouldn’t be coming back tonight in order to keep her from worrying.

She was still awake as evidenced by her quick reply. _Where r u?_

There was no real point to lying. She’d know soon enough. _Laurel’s_

_Oh thank god_

_I did not wanna have to be the one to tell her you’re still jerking off to her_

Oliver choked on the breath he’d been planning to take, his face turning red. His sister had heard — _That’s_ why she’d thought there might be someone in the bathroom. Those drugs had made him an idiot.

 _You’re not telling anyone,_ he wrote back, though it occurred to him the others could all likely guess based on the display Felicity had walked in on in the base. He was never going to live this down.

“Everything okay?” Laurel asked from the bed.

He set his phone aside and dove under the covers, burying his face in her hair. “Yes and no. Yes because I’m with you and no because of everyone else.”

Laurel hummed sympathetically and snuggled back against him. “They’ll get over it in time. Hopefully.”

“Hopefully?”

Laurel yawned, very unconcerned by the implications this might have for the power structure of his team. “When you’re done moping, can you turn out the light?”

“I still don’t mope.”

“Goodnight, Ollie,” was all she said with a smug smile in her voice. He lifted his head to lick the shell of her ear, knowing it was childish yet unable to help himself; his time acting under the influence of the love potion had shown him the whole world didn’t fall apart if he goofed off every now and then. Laurel shrieked and wriggled against him — which wasn’t great news for his efforts to calm his erection.

“ _Laurel,_ ” he groaned.

“It’s your fault,” she argued. Of course she would. Didn’t matter that she was technically right.

“Tomorrow morning,” Oliver vowed. “I’m buying condoms first thing tomorrow morning. We can celebrate your court win.”

“And what if I lose?”

He scoffed. As if. “Then someone’s going to need consoling, aren’t they?”

Laurel made a happy sort of noise in her throat. “I guess I’m winning either way tomorrow.”

“Yes, you are.” He reached up for the lamp and flicked it off. Then he leaned over and kissed her forehead before settling back down. “Goodnight, Laurel.”

“Goodnight.”

“I love you,” he added in the dark.

She reached back and squeezed his hand. “I love you, too.”

With his body still thrumming in arousal, he assumed sleep would take a while to arrive, yet as Laurel’s breathing evened out he found himself relaxing, too.

All told, the last forty-eight hours had been a confusing mess of ups, downs and realizations about himself. He wasn’t sure he ever wanted to repeat it.

But he might just have to thank Cupid.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So... yes, this was a oneshot. But as some of you may have seen, a few commenters really wanted a followup where Oliver actually confronted Diggle and Felicity about the team's past behavior towards Laurel as well as the teased celebration *wink* for Laurel winning her court case. So I worked this second part out to address both of those requests. Thanks very much to Okoriwadsworth from Lauriver discord fame as well as FFN for beta-reading this for me, and I hope you all enjoy!

Oliver had a hard time believing he was in sober reality the next morning upon waking up curled around Laurel’s sleeping form. Yet the events of last night were still clear in his mind, particularly the talk they’d had about no longer putting off what they could have together, so he could do little else but accept that this was his life now. And he did so happily.

Oliver pressed open-mouthed kisses to Laurel’s cheek, then down her neck and to her shoulder.

“Mm.” Laurel gave a contented sigh and shifted around to face him, her eyes blinking open lazily. “I could get used to this replacing my alarm.”

“Even if it’s earlier than your alarm?”

“It’ll go off in a minute.” She leaned in, pecking him on the lips. “How do you feel?”

“Just fine. There haven’t been any lingering side effects or anything,” he assured her. “And I think that was the best sleep I’ve had in a while.”

Laurel smiled. “Good.” Her next kiss was interrupted by the ringing of her phone alarm on the bedside table. “What did I tell you?” She leaned back to shut it off, then snuggled up to him once more.

“Don’t you have somewhere to be, Counselor?”

“In a minute. Too comfy.”

Oliver laughed. “Come on, you’re just gonna be in a rush later. I’ll make you breakfast.”

“Okay, those might be the magic words,” Laurel admitted, rolling out of the bed and stretching. Oliver got out on his own side. As much as he might be content to watch Laurel get dressed for the day, he had promised food. So he left her to it.

Oliver found a few eggs, some cheese and a single tomato in Laurel’s fridge. It was enough to make an omelet, so he did so, all the while writing up a grocery list in his head. If he was spending more time here, and he certainly hoped he would be, some of that time was going to be spent on making sure Laurel actually fed herself properly.

Laurel entered the kitchen in her pantsuit with hair and makeup done just as he was setting her plate down. “Wow. You didn’t have to do all that.”

“I wanted to. You’ve got a big day today.”

She shrugged. “It’s a pretty open-and-shut case, but I appreciate the thought.”

Oliver brought his own plate over to join her. “Here’s a thought I had: can I borrow your spare key?”

Laurel raised an eyebrow. “Why?”

“Because your kitchen is empty, and I’m going to need somewhere to put the groceries.”

“Ollie, you don’t have to buy me things,” Laurel said immediately, like he’d known she would. “You have to think about making your savings last.”

And there was an assumption there that warmed him as much as it tore at his heart; whatever the League decided to do next, Laurel already believed he would come out of it. “I’m not going to go overboard. But I figure if I’ll be over here and eating here, I should chip in for what I use.” He gestured down at his plate in demonstration. “And also you have nothing in your kitchen, and it kind of hurts to look at.”

She rolled her eyes. “Fine.” She stood, putting her plate in the sink and getting her keys. She also handed him a twenty dollar bill. “If you’re chipping in, I’m chipping in.”

Oliver nodded. “That works for me.”

Laurel checked the time and went to brush her teeth. She applied one last coating of lipstick before heading towards her front door. Oliver followed.

“I wish we had a little more time, but I really have to get down to the courthouse.”

“I understand. If I don’t make it down there for some of it, then we’ll meet up after.” He leaned in and kissed her cheek since she’d just put her lipstick on. “Knock ‘em dead.”

“I always do,” she replied with a smirk, then she headed out the door. Oliver stood there for a moment smiling to himself before deciding to get a move on with the day.

He did the dishes, knowing Laurel would complain about him doing too many chores around her apartment. But he maintained it was technically his mess. Then he actually did write a physical list of what he was going to pick up at the store.

He headed first back to his own place for a shower and change of clothes. Malcolm was God knew where, but Thea was just leaving her room as he stepped out of the bathroom. They both paused and looked at each other.

“Uh… hey.”

“Hi.” Oliver shifted in slight discomfort under her scrutiny.

“So you and Laurel worked things out?”

“Yeah. Not like — I’m not giving you anymore details.”

Thea snorted, then he shook his head, and they were both laughing.

“Roy, um, told me about the drug,” she explained once she’d calmed down. “So I get it. You weren’t totally in control of yourself.”

“I still should say sorry.”

Thea shrugged. “People do that stuff all the time. It’s not like I think you never have sex. I’d have to be an idiot. Just, you know, I’m glad.”

“Glad?”

“For you and Laurel. And that I didn’t mess things up because of… you know.” Her gaze fell on the carpet.

Oliver moved forward and hugged her to him. “You could never do that. And Laurel never would have blamed you. I was- I was just scared for you.” He kissed the top of her head. “But Laurel’s dedication to you is one of the things I love about her.”

Thea smiled as she looked up at him. “Well, I’m glad you’re okay admitting that again.”

“Me too.”

“Even if you needed a drug trip to go soul searching. Makes you wonder if I had the right idea before…”

Oliver’s smile turned to a grimace. “No. It does not.”

“Kidding.” She held up both hands and stepped back. “I’m gonna get some food and then probably sleep for like three more hours. Club schedule. You want anything?”

“I already ate.”

Thea nodded. “Okay. I’ll see you.” She left the loft, though he wasn’t far behind her in doing so.

Oliver’s next stop was the grocery store. He stuck to items that wouldn’t immediately go bad seeing as he never knew what their schedules would be like. Kitchen staples, fruits and vegetables. Part of Laurel’s continued training was going to have to include nutrition, and the thought occurred to him that he ought to check if Roy was doing likewise. Growing up largely on his own, he’d probably learned to make simple, easy meals out of a box if anything. That would have to change.

Oliver went back over to Laurel’s and used her spare key to let himself in. He set about putting the groceries away and collecting the spare bags. His phone buzzed with a text from her.

_in recess_

That would probably make it a good time for him to sneak over there to watch the rest of it. Even if a lot of the denser legal jargon went over his head, he liked seeing Laurel in her element. He could watch her win and then afterwards they could head back to her place and—

Oliver nearly smacked himself on the forehead. Condoms. How had he almost forgotten?

Well, the simple answer was that he’d never actually had to buy his own. The high-end hotel rooms he had first occupied with this or that nameless woman had included them as part of the amenities, usually, and once his parents realized he had become sexually active his mother had simply added them to the list of things the staff went out and bought for him. She’d thought it too embarrassing for a Queen to be seen purchasing such things in the public eye, but Oliver found himself retroactively embarrassed at the thought that some staffer had known far more about his sexual habits than he’d like. Thank God it hadn’t been Raisa.

No matter his feelings on the past, Oliver needed the item in the present, so he left Laurel’s apartment to locate a convenience store that sold them. He left her text unanswered as he doubted she needed to be distracted with those kind of thoughts at the moment.

Oliver kept his head slightly ducked as he passed the odd shopper or two on his way to the aisle that seemed best suited to his purpose. Sure enough, he found boxes and boxes of the item he sought. Oliver grabbed one from the brand he recognized, then with the box tucked close to his side in hopes of mostly hiding the label he made his way up to the register. He couldn’t quite avoid an older woman making a wide turn with her cart, and, as she passed him, she eyed the box and simply raised both eyebrows.

“Excuse me,” Oliver said, dodging around her.

“Mm-hm.”

The clerk was a pimply kid who was probably just old enough to have memories when Oliver was first shipwrecked. He didn’t give any indication he recognized Oliver either as he scanned the purchase and placed it in a bag for him. That transaction done, Oliver swiftly made to leave the store.

The old woman with her cart had gotten in line behind him and nodded to him when their eyes met with a knowing, “You have a good day, young man.”

Okay, maybe his mom had had a point about buying condoms being inherently embarrassing. Was there some kind of online option? He’d have to check.

Before he could get more than ten steps away from the store, however, a car pulled up beside him. Before he could do much more than tense in anticipation of some kind of threat, the window rolled down.

“Finally,” Felicity remarked. “We’ve been trying to catch up to you all day.”

“Felicity? John?”

For it was John behind the wheel. His friend hit some kind of button for the side door of the van to open, so Oliver climbed in to keep anyone else from seeing whatever conversation they were going to have.

“You should really get a Fitbit because I don’t even know how many steps you have today.”

“You were tracking me?”

“Just pinged your phone once or twice to try and meet up,” Felicity explained.

“Why?” Oliver winced at how blunt that sounded. It wasn’t like he didn’t want to meet up with his friends, but this was feeling less like a meetup and more like an ambush. “Shouldn’t you be at the office?”

Felicity waved a hand dismissively. “I’m doing stuff remotely. Told Ray that one of my friends was really sick yesterday. He understood.”

“I feel fine now,” he pointed out.

“That doesn’t mean we don’t still need to talk about all this, Oliver,” John said, his eyes on the road. And there it was. They were headed in the direction of the base, so Oliver simply waited in silence for the duration of the ride.

They all filed downstairs in a line, and he went to stand by one of the tables. Oliver set his bag from the convenience store down behind him, hyper aware of its contents and hoping neither of his friends had seen through the plastic. They already knew far more than he was comfortable with, and he had a suspicion that they wanted to know even more.

Sure enough, Digg looked over at Felicity once before saying, “So Cupid hit you with that stuff.”

“Yes.”

“And you just got detoxed last night.”

“Yes,” Oliver agreed again, not quite sure why his friend was going over information they all already knew.

“You haven’t even really been yourself for a full twenty-four hours.”

“Just say what you’re trying to say, John.”

It was Felicity who spoke up instead, stepping forward towards him. “We’re just worried that now might not be the best time for you to be making hugely life-altering decisions involving other people when you’ve been on a bender for two days.”

Oliver took that in for a moment. It sounded reasonable that they would be worried, but the more he thought about it in conjunction with the other behaviors he’d noticed from them both, it just didn’t sit right. “And I’d say you’d be right to worry — if any of the decisions I was making impacted either of you. But they don’t.”

“They’re going to impact the team, man,” John said.

“Really? Because I don’t remember the team getting conferenced in when you decided to get back together with Lyla. Or when you decided to date Ray,” Oliver added, with a gesture to Felicity. “So I’m not sure why my relationship with Laurel would be any different.”

“Things with you and Laurel are always different,” John maintained. “You just change, Oliver. You lose sight of what you’re doing, and it all becomes about her.”

“And it felt like you were finally able to work together on the team, you know, platonically,” Felicity added.

Oliver stared at them, wondering if perhaps they had experienced a different last few weeks than he had somehow. “We weren’t working together. I was— I was being horrible. Inexcusably cruel because I believed what you’re saying now, that the way I wanted to work with Laurel before was wrong. That she somehow blinded me to the truth when she was right all along last year about Sebastian. We fell for his setup of her hook, line and sinker, and who knows what might be different now if I hadn’t? If I had treated her like an equal.”

“But she’s not your equal, Oliver. None of us are,” John said before he could do much more than turn sharply in his direction. “We haven’t seen the things you have or done the things you did. Maybe Sara came the closest, but Laurel?”

“It’s not that her heart isn’t in the right place,” Felicity added quickly. “I think she has a chance to do something important for the team, something you or Sara couldn’t do. But John has a point. She just hasn’t gone through the kind of things you all did that make you heroes.”

He hung his head in dismay. Oliver didn’t know how he hadn’t realized these ideas getting started and rooting themselves into the framework of his team. They saw the island as some kind of perverse badge of honor, when he couldn’t see it as anything further than that.

“The things I went through… yes, if I hadn’t gone through them, I wouldn’t be doing any of this. Because I was selfish and lazy and unmotivated,” he stated harshly. “Even if I’d wanted my city to be better, I wouldn’t have dared to do anything about it myself. Laurel’s never had that problem. It has _never_ been about her not being my equal. I was never hers before the island. And my goal when I returned was to prove I could be, but I lost it along the way.”

“Because you had to do more for your city,” Digg insisted. “We realized that as a team, the three of us.”

“Right, just us three. What about Barry?” Oliver demanded, watching them both blink in surprise. “What has he gone through that Laurel hasn’t to earn his stripes? But I still offered him training because he’s our friend. Isn’t that right? You two brought him in, he’s accepted by the group. But because Laurel is someone important to my life outside of here, that’s bad for some reason.”

He could barely keep a rein on his voice, but the more he thought of everything they had done the last two and a half years, the more he realized just how badly they had acted.

“Or how about Roy, who was struggling on a drug and needed help. We as a team decided it made sense to bring him in on the secret. But not Laurel, right? Not when the things we were deciding were having impact — life-altering impact, even — on her,” he said, borrowing Felicity’s choice of words.

She winced and looked down. There was no real argument to be made about it; everything that had happened last year had touched Laurel’s life, whether it was Sara’s return, Slade’s quest for vengeance or Lance’s involvement with the Arrow that had gotten him both jailed and hospitalized at times.

“Why? Why did this double standard start? I can’t be the only one seeing it. You’re both smarter than that. Was it something I did or said? Did I indicate to you that this was how things should be? Was—”

John cut across him with a severe frown. “It’s just what was best for everyone.”

Oliver stilled. “Best how?”

His friend shook his head. “I told you, Oliver. When it came to Laurel, it was always her and everyone else be damned. You needed broken of that if you were ever going to be a hero.”

“So this really is still about Deadshot,” Oliver confirmed.

“It’s not about Deadshot, it’s about how you can’t keep your promises to your friends when your mind’s on Laurel.”

“I made promises to you and to Tommy,” Oliver said, almost right over him. It was time he finally set this straight. “Those promises happened to conflict, so I made the choice to commit to the one that saved an innocent boy’s life. And yes, I should have called you. That’s on me. But do you know what none of those things have to do with? Laurel.”

“She was there.”

“So that’s reason enough to ostracize her and make her feel she’s not good enough or part of this?” Oliver shook his head. “I’m to blame for the way I handled my own behavior, but you — I expect you both to speak up or call me out when you see me doing something wrong. You watched me become a hypocrite and the worst version of myself, and for what?”

He turned to Felicity then, who had been silent for quite some time. She’d never quite looked so conflicted as she looked between him and John. “It wasn’t like that.” She squared her shoulders, though her head was slightly lowered as she turned to face him fully. “I could see you were unhappy, but I thought that, someday, we could be happy. You and me.”

Oliver bowed his head to hide a wince.

“And I guess on some level I knew I didn’t have a chance when you were in love with Laurel,” Felicity admitted. “So what John said about it being a bad thing made sense to me — but that was selfish. I know that.”

Her speech was growing faster and faster by the second.

“But by the time I could admit that to myself, the damage was already sort of done, and I didn’t want to bring it up with you because I didn’t want there to be a huge fight that broke things up with the three of us. So I just tried to be a good friend to Laurel instead and support her becoming the Black Canary… but being a good friend would’ve meant helping both of you. I knew you were unhappy, and I knew it was because of all the fighting you were doing with her, that we’d encouraged.”

“I wasn’t just unhappy, Felicity,” he admitted. “I haven’t even felt like _me_ for months.”

Felicity swallowed and took a step closer. “I never wanted you to hate yourself or feel like you weren’t really Oliver anymore. I’ve realized what love’s really like with Ray, and it’s what you could have had with her. I’m sorry I — we,” she added with a glance back at John, who was hunched in on himself with a troubled frown. “—talked you out of it.”

“Thank you,” he said quietly. “But I’m not really the one who was hurt the worst by all of this. Which means things are going to have to change around here.”

Felicity looked up nervously. “Are we breaking up? The team, I mean, obviously we already broke up sort of.”

“No, the team isn’t breaking up,” he said, choosing to focus on the question itself rather than all the rest. “We’re going to be stronger. The whole team, not just this,” he said, gesturing between the three of them. “No more original members and exclusivity. We’re going to communicate with and support everyone who’s joined this mission. Laurel, Roy, Thea.” Hell, he’d be open to inviting Nyssa to join them if she truly was sticking around to help train Laurel. They needed all the help they could get. “And I will struggle with that more than anyone, probably, but that’s just the way it has to be now. I won’t have something like this happening to someone I care about again.”

He looked John square in the eye.

“You told me once that coming back from the island had given me something to fight for. Our loved ones are not blind spots. They’re our strength. And if you still have an issue with that, you’re going to talk to me instead of taking it out on someone else.”

John drew in a breath and nodded once. “I can do that.”

Oliver nodded back. He didn’t really know where he and John stood with each other at the moment or how he felt about a man he considered to be at the least a brother-in-arms. But he was determined not to let factions develop within this group the way it had done so many times on the island. They either survived this all together or they’d never make it out from under the League’s shadow.

“Well, that sounds like a start to me,” a voice that was familiar and yet had his heart leaping up into his throat spoke. Laurel walked fully out into the room, dressed as though she’d come to work out before overhearing their discussion. Her expression was unreadable, and he could see her surprise arrival didn’t have just him anxious. She would have needed to learn all of this, of course, but he’d wanted the option to break it to her a little more gently. Life never seemed to work out that way.

“How much…?” He began.

“Enough.” Laurel walked forward, though it wasn’t at the pace of one of her fury-fueled strides. “And I have something I want to say.”

As much as he feared what might happen — the little idyllic morning they’d had together seemed like a distant dream now — he knew she deserved to express however she felt about this. So he waited, hoping and dreading at once.

\---

Laurel had left the courtroom feeling pretty positive about the guilty verdict she’d won from the jury. Her eyes had scanned the benches, but it had seemed Oliver hadn’t quite made it down to City Hall. She’d checked her phone to find no new messages, so she’d begged off celebrating with her fellow prosecutor to head home.

The only evidence Oliver had even been there and gone had been her very full fridge and cabinets. Yet he hadn’t left a note to indicate where he might have gone from there. Laurel had decided to change out of her work clothes and into workout clothes; in all likelihood, she’d probably run into Oliver at the base if he’d gotten sidetracked by something.

Laurel let herself in through the backdoor, pausing with it still held open at the sound of raised voices. She shut it quietly and carefully behind her, creeping forward slowly to listen.

It was Oliver’s voice she picked up first, and she nearly jumped when she heard her own name. “What has he gone through that Laurel hasn’t to earn his stripes? But I still offered him training because he’s our friend. Isn’t that right? You two brought him in, he’s accepted by the group. But because Laurel is someone important to my life outside of here, that’s bad for some reason.”

They were… talking about her? And not just about her and Oliver’s newfound relationship. She’d expected that much. She hadn’t expected Oliver to come out swinging in her defense.

The more she listened, the more it became clear that this was about a much deeper wedge within the first three members of Team Arrow than just what had happened with Cupid the previous night. Laurel felt her eyes start stinging as she listened to both Oliver and then Felicity confirm that there had been some sort of effort to keep her apart from the others, and from Oliver most of all. She’d felt that way sometimes but had tried to brush it off as her making things up or assuming the worst. And apparently it had all started over an incident between Oliver and John she hadn’t even been aware of? How was that fair?

When Oliver revealed how unhappy and lost he had felt during this whole period, she could feel her heart tearing a little. Then he stated his desire for the team to operate in a new and better way, and her spirits were able to lift. That was the thing about Ollie; he always looked for the way forward, even from his own mistakes.

Laurel decided she had heard enough and chose to reveal her presence. “Well, that sounds like a start to me.”

The three of them all looked around at her, varying expressions of shock, alarm and even discomfort crossing their faces.

“How much…?”

“Enough.”

She watched Felicity shrink in on herself at her approach and John shift about, uncomfortable and shame-faced. “And I have something I want to say.”

The three of them all gave looks or nods that they were willing to hear it, at the least.

“I know that some of this secret keeping and closing ranks was part of the nature of this whole setup. And considering some of my behavior last year, I wasn’t the easiest person to get to know,” she started off, mostly directing her attention to John and Felicity. “Nevertheless, I don’t exactly appreciate what amounts to a smear campaign being conducted against me and to my oldest friend.”

“We know,” Felicity said. “And I’m sorry.”

“Thank you. And I’m glad you at least tried to make some amends before Oliver brought this up.” She looked to John specifically. “I didn’t realize we had some kind of issue, but if we ever do again, tell me to my face.”

“It wasn’t — you weren’t the problem,” John admitted. “I think I knew that on some level. It was just easier… but it wasn’t right. And it won’t happen again.”

“I hope not.” If they were all going to manage to keep working together, it couldn’t happen again. Laurel then turned to Oliver. “Can we talk in private?”

“We’ll give you the room,” Felicity said quickly before Oliver had barely opened his mouth. She seemed eager to get out of the situation, and Laurel supposed that was to be expected. Felicity and John both headed up the steps and out of sight, leaving her and Oliver in silence for a moment.

“Laurel, I’m so sorry. If I hadn’t listened or let myself be convinced — some of the things I’ve said.” He looked utterly miserable just to contemplate them. “There’s so much I wish I could take back.”

“You can’t change what you did, but you know it wasn’t right.” Laurel stepped forward and hugged him, feeling him hesitate for a moment before returning her embrace. “And thank you for saying something.”

“I don’t deserve thanks for pointing out what was there,” he disputed.

Laurel pulled back a little, gripping his shoulders to hold him in place. “No, but if I had tried saying something, I would’ve been dismissed as making things up or causing trouble for no reason. You made it impossible to deny, so now hopefully something actually changes.”

Oliver looked to grudgingly concede the point, though his mood still felt rather down. Laurel was fairly sure that would be true for most of their team members if they were forced into the same space right now.

“I think maybe we all need a night off this,” she said, gesturing around the base. Oliver nodded, though when he went to follow her out he quickly doubled back for a single plastic bag sitting on the table he’d been standing by.

“Should I take you back to your place?” Laurel asked once they got into her car.

“Huh?” Oliver looked up from the text he was drafting. A brief glance showed it to be some form of group message, likely to let the others know they had the night off.

“Don’t you need to drop that off?” She nodded to the bag sitting in his lap. For some reason, Oliver seemed to shift uncomfortably.

“No. It’s actually going to your place. I think,” he added.

“You already bought me groceries. I’m not sure what else I really need.”

“Uh, well, it’s — look, I went out before all of that back there and didn’t have time to drop it off.”

“Okay,” Laurel agreed slowly. He didn’t look ready to elaborate past that, and she needed to keep her attention on the road so she didn’t press it. At least, not until they were in the elevator up to her floor.

“So…”

But Oliver shook his head as the doors opened at the lobby level, and a man got in for the sixth floor. Laurel crossed her arms and tried not to pout. Was it some kind of surprise?

When they were finally alone in her apartment with the door firmly shut behind them, Laurel turned and snagged the bag, succeeding only in stretching the plastic since Oliver was still keeping a vice grip on the handles. But it was enough to read the label.

“Oh.”

Oliver cleared his throat and shuffled back a step. “Like I said, I got it before that whole talk. I can understand if we need a break because of all that.”

It was good of him to make that offer, to leave her the choice. And it was a lot to learn, but then, she’d already known it was happening on at least a subconscious level. If anything, she felt better now knowing the others had acknowledged it and were at least saying they would do better. Oliver definitely already was. And they’d agreed their time might be limited thanks to the League.

So she shook her head. “No. I said I wanted to live my life, not wait for a better time to do it. But maybe let’s start with something to eat. I didn’t get the chance to grab anything thanks to the case, and it sounds like you were pretty busy today, too.”

Oliver relaxed a little and set the bag on her coffee table. “I can throw something together.”

“You’re sure? I don’t want to make you cook all the time.”

“It’s not a hardship,” he maintained. “And it’s better for you. Healthier eating makes training that much easier as well.”

Okay, he probably had a point there. Laurel led him into the kitchen and helped him to locate the various pots and pans he needed. Oliver made a relatively simple pasta and trusted her to put a salad together, which she thought she managed pretty well.

By the time they were sitting down to eat, it was dark outside, but not too late. “So how’d the case go? Since I didn’t quite get down there.”

Laurel happily launched into an overview; it had been about a misappropriation of funds caught by an internal audit, so nothing related to the work they’d been doing in the field. Though it was sad to know that they were often too busy dealing with things like the League to focus on issues such as that which were the real endemic problems this city faced. Oliver seemed to agree and listened with rapt attention to her whole retelling of the trial. It was nice just getting to spend an evening talking about things that weren’t tied up in centuries-old Leagues or plots to get one of their teammates killed.

Though as she placed her dishes in the sink and rinsed them off, Laurel wondered what Oliver’s plans were now. As much as she wouldn’t mind him staying the night again — quite the opposite, really — she didn’t want to keep him away from his family when he’d told her that was one of the things he needed to feel like himself.

So Laurel looked over her shoulder as he approached with his own dishes and asked, “What does Thea think of this? Does she know about us?”

“She, uh, does,” he answered. “And she seems fine with it. You know, probably wants spared some of the details, but — she’s always looked up to you and seen you as family. I think you and I working things out is exactly the sort of thing she might have hoped for.”

Laurel felt herself relax a little at those words. She didn’t mind what most people might think about them giving things another try, but Thea was different. Laurel very much still wanted to be in her life.

“Maybe we could do breakfast with her tomorrow? I don’t want to hog you,” she said while setting the washed dishes in her drying rack.

Oliver waited for her to turn towards him before setting his hands on her waist. “I think that'd be great.” He pecked her on the lips and then stepped back to allow her past him for a towel to dry her hands. He got out his phone. “I’ll send her the invite.”

“So I take it you’re not planning to see her yourself tonight?” Laurel paused with one hand on the archway before continuing out to the living room.

He followed her. “Only if that’s alright with you.”

She smiled and dropped down onto her couch, patting the space beside her. Oliver joined her, and she leaned into his space for a longer kiss. “That’s more than alright.”

They shared a smile before going back to reacquainting themselves with each other’s mouths. It somehow felt like an age and yet as if no time at all had passed between when they’d last shared this kind of simple closeness. But Laurel wanted more.

She undid the zipper on her jacket and smiled against his lips when Oliver moved to help push it down her arms. His one hand stopped midway down and he broke off the kiss.

Laurel blinked. “What’s wrong?”

A moment later, she realized. He was looking at an angry red mark cut into her upper arm. She’d since gotten Roy’s help to remove the stitches, but it would take some time before it started to fade.

Oliver traced the raised line with one finger. The hairs on her arm stood up at the light caress, but she found herself wondering at the sad look in his eyes.

“I always told myself you wouldn’t have these,” he murmured.

“Scars?” Laurel shook her head. She turned her wrist over to show him a thin white line. “These came from the cuffs the Dollmaker had me in. I didn’t realize I’d pulled hard enough to cut the skin until I got home that night.” She drew her arm back and tilted her chin up, gesturing to her neck. “Cyrus Vanch put a knife to my throat, though that mark’s faded some with time.”

She couldn’t even tally up the number of bruises from falls or being grabbed too roughly, scrapes on her face and hands that had since healed up as if they were never there.

“I was always going to have scars, Ollie. But I’m glad that now they’re because I am _doing_ something about the people that want to hurt others instead of just being one of their victims.”

“I never saw you as a victim. I saw you as someone innocent of all the things I was doing,” Oliver explained. “I guess I thought that being out there, fighting, it had to mean there was something, something wrong with a person. But you’ve shown that’s not true. Barry’s shown that’s not true. Sometimes people are just too good not to get involved.”

She leaned forward a little bit, laying a hand over his heart. “And isn’t that what keeps you going out there? Whatever else you’ve done in the past, Oliver, it’s the good in you that keeps you fighting.”

A grateful smile rose on his lips. “Sometimes it’s hard to be sure, but you’re always there to remind me.”

He leaned back in to capture her lips with his own, and this kiss was heated from the start. Laurel’s hands roamed from his chest and around to his back, seeking the hem of the sweater he wore. When she pulled it up, breaking the kiss to bring it over his head, his burning gaze made her mouth run dry.

“I never did thank you for getting the antidote from Cupid,” Oliver said, his voice low in a way that sent a shiver straight down to her core.

“I was promised a celebration for winning my case, too,” she reminded him. “I think I know a way we can accomplish both.”

He licked his lips and leaned over for the box of condoms, letting Laurel pull him up from the couch with one hand. If she was getting laid for the first time in nearly two years, she wanted to be comfortable.

Her heart was pounding in her chest just at the thought. She hadn’t had much need or time to think about sex in those years considering the mess her life had been, but there had been scattered nights made all the more frustrating by a vibrator sitting in the back of her bedside drawer that had only served as a reminder of what she was missing. Would he think that pathetic? How did he even want to keep coming back to her?

Oliver’s lips and then his hand caressed her jaw. “You okay? We don’t have to do this.”

“No, I want to. I- I’m always gonna want you, Ollie,” she confessed. “I just don’t know why you…”

He seemed to understand what she couldn’t finish asking out loud, for he hugged her close for a moment. “It was never because of you. It was my own issues that kept me thinking I couldn’t have this. That you deserved better. I still think that.”

She pulled back to look him in the eye. “I don’t care what I deserve. People rarely get that.”

“I know. I know that now,” he agreed softly, tucking a strand of her hair behind her ear that had escaped her ponytail. “So I’m not leaving, not if there’s anything I can do to prevent it.” They both knew they couldn’t make promises of forever what with the League still an ominous presence on the edge of their lives. “I wish I had stayed before, too,” he admitted.

Laurel blinked back moisture in her eyes wondering how their lives might have gone had that been the case. It didn’t matter. They were here now. “Then stay with me tonight.”

She molded her lips to his and her body to his own, feeling his one hand rub up and down her back. The rustle of the bag told her it was still hanging from his other arm, which he was using to search out the doorknob to her bedroom. As they stumbled through, Laurel took the bag and tossed it onto her bedside table, then returned her attentions to Oliver himself.

He lifted her tank top over her head and then went for the sports bra, where they’d been stopped the previous evening. They certainly weren’t stopping now, and she watched him lick his lips a second time as her chest was exposed to the open air. Laurel removed her hair tie and shook her head a little to let her hair spill down her back and over her shoulders.

Oliver stepped closer, trailing his hand again down a strand and following to where it met skin. Then he traced the calloused tips of his fingers across her collarbone and down over the swell of her breast. Her hands landed on his hips, needing something to ground her, and his eyes snapped up to hers. Dark with arousal, but, unlike the last time, totally clear.

They surged together again, hands touching and teasing bare flesh. She wanted him everywhere at once, but nowhere more than where the heat within her was starting to flow. Laurel’s palm smoothed down his abs and to the growing bulge in his pants, feeling him press against her with a low groan in his throat.

“Bed.”

“Is that a question or a- _hmm,_ ” Laurel’s quip turned into a hum as she squirmed thanks to Oliver plunging a hand under the waistband of her leggings. He rubbed at the cotton fabric covering her center, barely even there but driving her to distraction.

She maintained enough presence of mind to undo his belt buckle, pausing as he did to kick off shoes before falling back onto the mattress. Oliver remained standing long enough to yank both pants and underwear down past his full erection before stepping out of them. It was Laurel’s turn to lick her lips.

Not to be outdone, she shimmied out of her remaining garments, glad to be rid of them since they’d started getting wet with her own desire. She was really going to need to do some laundry soon at the rate she was going.

Oliver stroked himself once as he stood there watching her, and Laurel’s teeth sank into her bottom lip as she saw him grow just that much bigger and harder. She lunged blindly behind her for the bag with its box of condoms — and God was she glad he’d had the foresight not to get just a single pack — and hurried to open it and produce one.

He took it from her and placed one knee on the bed as he rolled it over his length, then knelt fully. Laurel scooted back to make room for him, her legs falling open and more slick leaking out of her folds.

“You’re ready?” He asked, his voice rough in a way that only made him sound more vulnerable. At Laurel’s frantic nod, his smile crinkled his eyes at the corners, and some of the weariness he’d been carrying the last few months seemed to melt away. She wondered if she looked the same. “Let me kiss you.”

She kissed him before he could finish leaning in, her mouth slower but still insistent against his. She felt hands smooth up her thighs, fingers kneading some of the built-up muscle there for a few moments, before continuing higher.

A sigh left her mouth unbidden as she felt the head of his cock press up to her entrance, and he slid both his length and his tongue into her at the same moment. Laurel moaned around his tongue while her one leg hooked around his body, seeking to push him in further. She could feel his answering groan deep within her bones.

She didn’t know how long they stayed like that, panting into each other’s mouths as they felt the completeness that came from being totally joined. But eventually, they both felt the need to move.

Laurel couldn’t say what it was that allowed them to be so in tune after all the years. But she knew him, and he knew her, and perhaps that included knowing the precise rhythm to set as he slowly rolled his hips to meet her rocking motion into him.

She’d missed this so much, and it was hard to imagine how only a few short days ago she’d been resigned to never feeling this way again. To loving him from afar. To never knowing his gentle touch or the fullness of him inside her again. But here she was, basking in those exact sensations and feeling a _rightness_ that only came from being with him, and him with her.

Her body arched back into the pillows as heat spread through her. She watched Oliver through hooded eyes; his own closed in bliss as he devoted himself to their lovemaking. Laurel reached up with a hand to stroke his cheek, her breath hitching a little when he turned his head to kiss her palm, then her wrist and following up her arm as far as he could reach.

When he placed his thumb and forefinger to her clit, she couldn’t hold in a shout, and that seemed to spur him on with faster strokes and greater friction.

“That’s it, Ollie,” she encouraged, almost breathless. “Need you harder, faster, more — ah!”

He’d hit the one spot inside her that guaranteed she was going to completely lose her senses. Laurel hiked her leg up his backside, heel digging into firm flesh as they both hissed in pleasure at the changed angle and how it brought him that much deeper into her. She could feel his balls brushing against her with every thrust. Laurel’s hand snuck down between their bodies, pausing for a moment to make her intention clear.

“Okay?”

He nodded, and she cupped first one and then the other in her hand, stroking gently. Past experience said he didn’t want a lot of attention down there, just that little bit.

Sure enough, Oliver moaned and stiffened for a moment. She thought he might be about to come — but he pulled himself back from whatever brink and bent over her, pressing her down into the mattress with his kisses and his hands touching every sensitive spot he could reach as his thrusts lost all rhythm. But her body was too strung-out on pleasure to notice or care much. He was hitting her g-spot with enough regularity that she was liable to go hoarse from all the moaning and crying out she was doing. Everything felt so good, and she never wanted it to stop.

It did, of course, both all too soon and just when she’d needed it to keep from being driven crazy. Laurel’s ecstasy exploded behind her eyelids, rushing through her and setting every nerve alight for a single, shining moment. She arched up off the bed and was caught with an arm slung around her back to hold her as Oliver shuddered and heat pulsed from him, filling the condom as his thrusts grew slower and more halting.

They held like that in the half-sitting, half-leaning embrace they’d found themselves in. Then Laurel kissed his shoulder and he slowly helped her lower back down. Moments later, she felt the loss as he slipped out of her and something landed in her nearby trash can with a _plop._ Oliver was back in her arms before she could voice any complaint, surrounding her with warmth and a feeling of secure contentment.

“I needed that,” she said with a satisfied smile.

“So did I.” The way he was snuggled around her seemed to indicate he was not intending to get up any time soon, but she at least had a toothbrush and other toiletries in her bathroom that she would like to use before sleeping. But she could always get to it in a moment.

This, them, was too precious to let go to waste. No matter what anyone else thought about it, she and Ollie had finally found their way back against all the odds. She couldn’t help a rising confidence that they could surmount whatever might be coming from the League as well. They’d already been through so much and lost so much together.

“Tomorrow we’ll spend some time with Thea and have a talk with the full team,” Oliver planned aloud. “And then John will revoke my position as his best man.”

Laurel shook her head. “I don’t think he could have done everything he has with you to be that upset over this. And if he is? Well,” she shrugged, a part of her worried to assume Oliver’s response one way or the other.

He stroked her hair. “If he is that upset, I’ll be wondering how someone I consider a brother could be so set against me finally getting things right, the way he and Lyla finally have.” He blew out a breath. “But that’s tomorrow.”

Laurel searched around for the duvet on her bed to pull it up. Her body was starting to cool down and she knew they’d want some cover regardless. She listened to the sound of his heartbeat under her ear, letting it soothe her as she drifted off to sleep with him.

They had each other whatever some thought, and if those individuals didn’t like it they could go screw themselves. Laurel had a feeling she was well taken care of in that department from now on. She smiled to herself and was soon drifting off to dreams, the first time she’d had those in some months. Perhaps choosing to go on with her life was the best way forward after all.

She could see her sister’s smile again. _“I told you, didn’t I? Ollie needs you.”_

She slept soundly the rest of the night.


End file.
